Cypriots like big houses

Cypriots seem to have a liking for big houses, with two thirds of the population living in under-occupied dwellings — the second highest rate in the EU after Ireland, according to figures released by Eurostat on Wednesday.

The same figures showed Cyprus has the lowest overcrowding rates (2.4%) in the European Union.

According to Eurostat data, 16.6% of the EU population lived in overcrowded households in 2016, while more than one in three persons (34.8%) EU-wide lived in under-occupied dwellings, meaning that the houses were deemed to be too large.

In 2016, over two-thirds of the population were living in under-occupied dwellings in Ireland (70.6%), Cyprus (69.6%), Malta (68.4%) and Belgium (67.0%). Under-occupancy was also the case for around half the population in Spain (55.7%), Luxembourg (54.1%), the United Kingdom (51.5%), the Netherlands (51.4%) and Finland (48.0%).

In contrast, fewer than 15% of the population were living in dwellings deemed to be too large in Romania (6.3%), Hungary (8.5%), Latvia (9.6%), Greece (10.2%), Croatia (10.4%), Bulgaria (10.5%), Slovakia (11.4%), Poland (14.2%) and Italy (14.9%).

Across Member States, almost half the population in Romania (48.4%) were living in overcrowded households in 2016. This was also the case for around two in every five persons in Latvia (43.2%), Bulgaria (42.5%), Croatia (41.1%), Poland (40.7%), Hungary (40.4%) and Slovakia (37.9%), and for around one in four in Greece (28.7%), Italy (27.8%) and Lithuania (23.7%).

At the opposite end of the scale, the lowest overcrowding rates were recorded in Cyprus (2.4%), Malta (2.9%), Ireland (3.2%), Belgium (3.7%), the Netherlands (4.0%) and Spain (5.4%). Overcrowding was also an issue for fewer than 10% of the population in Finland (6.6%), Germany (7.2%), France (7.7%), the United Kingdom (8.0%), Luxembourg (8.1%) and Denmark (8.2%).